In contemporary computer systems, “gadgets” generally refer to relatively small, lightweight application programs that provide a wide variety of possible uses. For example, gadgets can connect to web services to deliver weather information, news updates, traffic maps, Internet radio streams, and slide shows of online photo albums. Gadgets can also integrate with existing application programs to streamline a user's interaction with them. For example, a gadget can give an at-a-glance view of a user's online instant messaging contacts, the day view from a calendar, and/or an easy way to control a media player. Gadgets can also have any number of dedicated purposes, e.g., to access calculators, games, sticky notes, and so forth.
At the same time, users of contemporary computer systems are able to view and generally interact with selected content on a small auxiliary display device coupled to or integrated into a main host computer system. To this end, an auxiliary display screen, along with an operating system-provided platform (referred to as an auxiliary display platform, or a Windows® SideShow™ platform), enables developers and authors to present content to users. This allows the user to view the content on the auxiliary display device even when the main host computer system is in a reduced power state (e.g., ACPI S3 sleep state), or even turned off.
The use of gadgets in conjunction with an auxiliary display device (or other devices) when available would provide computer users with numerous benefits.